UK's Count Binface inspires call for satire in Joburg as City Power failures make normal politics look more absurd.
London mayoral candidate Count Binface poses for a photo on College Green beside the Palace of Westminster in London on April 25, 2024. (Photo by BENJAMIN CREMEL / AFP)
Former French president Charles de Gaulle had it spot-on when he said: “Politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.”
Nowhere is that statement lived more than in the UK, whose people have always been some of the finest exponents of the art of skewering pompous politicians.
In the ’60s and ’70s, the Monster Raving Loony Party, headed by Screaming Lord Sutch, was the counter-culture weapon to hit back at the establishment.
Today, that fine tradition is being continued by perennial joke candidate Count Binface, a self-described “intergalactic space warrior”.
Standing in a recent by-election in England – which he lost, how about that? – he promoted a policy of nationalising singer Adele, capping Flake chocolate bars at 99p and forcing water company executives to swim in the rivers they pollute.
Now, the Count is to stand against Reform party leader Nigel Farage, who resigned his seat in response to a sleaze scandal. But, we wonder, couldn’t we have someone similar for the Joburg mayoral race?
A Duke Pikitup, perhaps, running a platform of forcing City Power executives to crank hand generators every time there is a power outage?
If that sounds absurd, just consider the normal state of our politics…
